OVERCOMER - Week 4
Daily Scripture Readings
Monday: Acts 24:5-9
Tuesday: 2 Timothy 1:1-18
Wednesday: 2 Timothy 2:1-13
Thursday: 2 Timothy 2:14-26
Friday: 2 Timothy 3:1-9
Saturday: 2 Timothy 3:10-17
Sunday: 2 Timothy 4:1-8
Opening Prayer
Lord Jesus, I am your witness. I long to be like you.
I receive your righteousness and release my sinfulness.
I receive your wholeness and release my brokenness.
I receive your fullness and release my emptiness.
I receive your peace and release my anxiety.
I receive your joy and release my despair.
I receive your healing and release my sickness.
I receive your love and release my selfishness.
Come, Holy Spirit, transform my heart, mind, soul, and strength so that my consecration becomes your demonstration; that our lives become your sanctuary. For the glory of God our Father, Amen.
DEVOTION:
This devotion is from J.D. Walt and Seedbed’s Daily Text (July 23, 2024) titled, “The Truth About Hard Times”
Here at Acts 24, as we are making the turn toward the homestretch of the Acts of the Apostles, it is a good moment for an aerial view. It is essential in life, particularly in the midst of difficulties, to try and get to a high place where we can see the larger landscape of our lives and ask some bigger and harder questions and perhaps gain a deeper and wider perspective.
Isn’t it fascinating how this entire story of the movement of God’s kingdom and the advance of the church Jesus is building has come to an apparent grinding halt as we find ourselves in the coastal town of Caesarea in the Roman-occupied nation of Israel (a piece of ground about the size of the state of New Jersey) in a courtroom presided over by a provincial governor at litigation between the religious establishment of Israel and a Roman citizen who was a Jewish man named Paul of Tarsus?
In the scheme of things, it appears to be a very small and even insignificant story. The stories that turn out to be the most significant stories in history most always begin (and end) in obscurity and apparent insignificance. They most often occur in the midst of incredibly challenging times, when the chips are down and backs are against the wall. The actors in such stories have no idea of the significance of the part they are playing. They are mostly doing the next good, and often hard, thing. They often feel like abysmal failures; taking one step forward and half a dozen backward. They are, as we rehearsed last week, experiencing the challenging realities of being, “hard pressed on every side, perplexed, persecuted, and struck down.” And when they can manage to catch the occasional aerial view, they breathe the gifted and rarified air of knowing—because of Jesus with, for, in, and through them—they are, “not crushed, not in despair, not abandoned, not destroyed.” Therefore, by the power of the Holy Spirit, they persevere. Their goal is never greatness; only goodness.
I saw an image the other day with a progression of four statements. I can’t unsee it. I think about it all the time. If I know you, and I think I do, I suspect it will have the same impact on you. Here they are:
Hard times produce people of strong character.
People of strong character produce prosperous times.
Prosperous times produce people of weak character.
People of weak character produce hard times.
The latter half of the last century was a period of enormous prosperity for many people. It was wrought by the strong character of faith-filled generations who lived through the hard times of the first half of that century. My sense of things is that the ensuing prosperity has lulled generations to sleep, and led to significant weakness in character. Leisure and entertainment seem to be at an all-time high. Notice the utter flourishing of the alcohol industry with the proliferation of wine, bourbon, craft beer, and the rapid rise of the legalized marijuana industry, and the stratospheric rise of the legalized gambling and casino industry with sports books literally opening up everywhere. We are now living in a very broken moment in history characterized by multitudes of broken people (many in church) who are not dealing with their brokenness, but who are opting instead for the distraction of entertainment and the medication of a thousand substances. For all these reasons and more, hard times are approaching again and perhaps have already arrived. It’s why I keep saying—chiefly to myself and also to you:
WAKE UP, SLEEPERS! RISE FROM THE DEAD! AND CHRIST WILL SHINE ON YOU!
He is our character. And he must win the battle! He will do it through our sowing. Sow like a champion today!